


A New Beginning

by KarenHunt



Category: Sharing Knife - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Alternate Point of View
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-07
Updated: 2011-02-07
Packaged: 2017-10-15 12:00:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 15,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/160623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KarenHunt/pseuds/KarenHunt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sumac and Arkady join forces.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> With thanks to Joyce Pendle, who made useful suggestions in the shaping of the tale

Fall had come to Oleana; morning frost chilled the ground and the leaves on the trees were turning colors. Sumac rode up toward Hickory Lake with Rig Crow and Iwassa Muskrat; the once-every-two-years hinterland meeting had ended, and they were bringing news of the current allotments of patrol sectors to Fairbolt Crow. The load for these next two years was going to be heavier than the previous one; trying to meet the demand would make for an interesting couple of years for Hickory Lake Camp -- they'd fallen behind trying to deal with their last allotment, she didn't know how they'd manage this one.

The path widened enough for three abreast, so Rig nudged his horse up alongside Sumac, on the other side of Iwassa. He said, "I'm glad the meeting's done with. I was wondering for a time there if we'd ever get it wrapped up. After we give the allotments to Fairbolt, I plan to head over to my tent and just sit without saying anything for at least an hour. Having to listen to the children quarrel will be nothing compared to listening to a great bunch of company captains fighting it out."

Iwassa chuckled. "I'm more thinking of going out in my narrowboat as far away from any arguing as I can get. How about you, Sumac?"

She shook her head. "I'm afraid the hinterland meetings haven't been able to match Tent Redwing yet. I was mostly thinking I'd like to find Uncle Dag and talk to him for a bit. I expect he's home. Captain Dag Redwing. I thought he'd never agree to a promotion; I wonder how Fairbolt got him to take it?" She was looking forward to telling her Uncle Dag about the springtime malice her patrol had encountered. She hoped she might win one of his rare smiles when she told him how his ratty old coat had saved her life.

Iwassa said, "Likely he's getting resty by now. From the official report we got two weeks ago, I wouldn't expect he'd be anything like recovered yet. I suppose he won't be a member of my company any more, but I think I'll be wanting to check up on him soon anyway."

Rig frowned. "Yes, now you mention it. He did a real fine job out in Raintree; I was thinking I'd like to ask him a few questions about his planning for that last battle. Iwassa, what'd you think about that Log Hollow fellow's tale? You know, the one where Dag went alone into a malice lair down near Glassforge? Do you suppose him being a captain might finally put a stop to those crazy stunts?"

Iwassa's lips twisted. "I can wish. Problem is he wants to get killed. Unless that changes, I don't see much chance of it. Though I do wonder.... Is he even going to be able to captain properly? You just can't _do_ that sort of thing as a captain."

Rig snickered. "Maybe that farmer girl the fellow spoke of changed him."

This time, Iwassa's eyes rolled. "Oh, right! I'll believe Dag's evil horse jumped the cliff before I'll believe it about him!"

Rig then said, "I've touched grounds with the bridge guard." They rode in silence the rest of the way to the bridge leading up to Hickory Lake Camp.

When they reached the bridge, Rig smiled and nodded to the guard. The young man swallowed, saying, "Sumac! I have some messages for you. Your papa and your grandmama both want you to see them first thing when you come in. So does Fairbolt, but he says that no matter who else wants to talk to you, you should see him first, in private."

Sumac's brows drew down. "What's this about? Is this something to do with Uncle Dag?"

He looked down, frowning deeply. "I'm not allowed to talk about it; you're supposed to see Fairbolt and he'll explain everything."

"All right, then, I'll head over there first off." She tried not to picture what would happen at Tent Redwing when Papa and Grandmama learned she'd not obeyed their instructions. They started across the bridge in silence.

At the shore road, Rig handed her the list of sectors and their report about the meeting, saying, "I suppose you might as well give the allotments to him while you're there. It sounds like we aren't to be going with you."

She rode to patrol headquarters on her own. It was hard to shake off a feeling of doom. She didn't think she'd have gotten this reception from the guard if Uncle Dag had died, but she couldn't come up with any alternative theory.

Fairbolt met her at the headquarters' front door. "Come on in, and sit down. We have a lot to talk about."

She walked into his office; he closed the door behind her. This was not looking good. She pulled a chair up to his desk and sat; he sat as well. She really hoped she wasn't about to be handed Uncle Dag's newly-primed knife or some such.

Out of a sense of duty, and wishing to put off whatever this was going to be, she gathered up the allotments and her report on the meeting. As she handed them to Fairbolt, she said, "We have more sectors rather than fewer, I'm afraid. When we learned about the troubles in Raintree, we threw out all the work we'd done and started over; this time figuring to help them as best we could. That's why the meeting went so long this time. Mostly what this means for us is that we've got a good number of sectors in eastern Raintree in addition to most of our usual ones for the next two years."

Fairbolt shook his head and sighed, but he didn't protest. They spoke of the meeting and the sectors that Hickory Lake had been allotted for a few more minutes. Once they'd finished, however, and she'd run out of additional comments to make, Fairbolt cleared his throat and said, "I don't know any way to make my news for you easier. Dag left camp about a month ago. I doubt he'll ever return."

Sumac stared. After a moment, she said, "He's left for good several times now. He's always come back after a while." She wondered what Grandmama had done this time to set him off. Last time he'd left, a bit over eight years ago, he'd stayed away nearly a year and a half.

Fairbolt shook his head. "This time is different." He paused. "Have you heard anything about his actions this summer?"

She nodded cautiously. "I heard about the Raintree malice, of course, and I've read the report you wrote about it." That didn't seem to be quite what Fairbolt was after, so she described the Glassforge tale she'd heard at the meeting, concluding with, "Can you imagine that Log Hollow fellow thinking Uncle Dag would jump the cliff with a farmer girl? I'm with Iwassa on that one -- Copperhead'll do that before Dag does!"

Fairbolt squeezed his eyes shut. "I'd have thought the same. But it's true. He showed up string-bound with a young farmer girl, Fawn Bluefield, and he named himself as Dag Bluefield. There was a big argument in camp over what to do about it; your papa and grandmama ended up bringing the matter to the camp council. They claimed the cords were false because Dag helped Fawn make hers. Of course, she helped him with his, too, but that didn't count with them. There are real limits to what I can say about the matter, due to it being council business, but I will say this. Those cords are every bit as real as any other cords I've ever seen. What their claim did was it provided a way to try to get rid of her without having to threaten to banish Dag. Three of the folk on the council voted that the cords were false, three voted they were true. I abstained, because Dag said he didn't care how the vote went; he'd leave the following day anyway. In effect, he's chosen to banish himself. He gave good reasons for why he was leaving; I gave him my blessing when he left. I hope he finds an answer.... Anyway. A lot of folk don't really believe he was serious; they reckon he was just besotted and that he was making excuses. Most everyone is still upset, so you'll be hearing a deal about it. I'd recommend that you talk to Mari first before anyone else; while he and Fawn were here, they put up a tent between Sarri Otter's place and hers. Mari was also at Glassforge and in his company in Raintree, so she's had the best view of the events of anyone in camp."

Sumac sat stunned, looking at his desk. After a minute or so, she looked up. Opening her mouth to speak, she realized she had no words to say, so she closed it again. She did not cry. It took some work, but at least she could manage that much. _How had this happened? What would she do now?_ She felt like she was in a boat floating loose on the lake with no paddle to steer it. After some more time spent staring at Fairbolt, she stood and walked out without saying a word.

Talking with great-aunt Mari and Dirla -- they'd been doing archery practice together, but they broke off when she arrived -- filled in some details, but didn't change the basic picture Fairbolt had given her. Afterwards, she stopped by Mare Island to put her horse to pasture and talk with Mama. Omba didn't have many details to add; she'd been forbidden by Grandmama to pay Dag any visits until he'd gotten rid of the farmer girl.

Sumac began helping Omba with the mares. She was a bit startled to sense just how many of them were in foal. When she commented on it, Omba said ruefully, "Well. That'd be because Rig Crow's stallion swam across a bit over a month ago and had himself a fine old time. I'm guessing I'll be in trouble with him as soon as he learns about it all. Not long now, I suppose."

Sumac shook her head. In other circumstances, she might have made a joke about it to lighten her mama's mood, but today she didn't think she had any laughter in her. She kept helping Omba to keep her mind off all that she'd learned. She also did not want to deal with Grandmama in the mood she'd surely be in. For purposes of delaying the inevitable, it was good up till dinnertime. As she expected, when she and Omba finally left the island and arrived ... home ... (except how could it be home with her uncle gone for good?), she endured a much more unpleasant description of the summer's events. Papa and Grandmama took turns competing in who could say the ugliest things about Dag's farmer girl.

After a few days of this, Grandmama changed the subject. To Sumac's need to get string-bound and start a family and do her duty for Tent Redwing. Every blighted minute of every blighted day. Papa joined in after not too long. Sumac did what she could to avoid them; she spent long hours doing combat practice with her patrol, or helping with the horses on Mare Island, or visiting great-aunt Mari and great-uncle Cattagus.

About five days later, a messenger came up to her while she was on Mare Island. Fairbolt wanted to see her; it wasn't urgent -- it was time for her yearly review. She decided that she might as well head over sooner rather than later, so she ground-tapped her mama to let her know she was heading out and went over to headquarters.

She and Fairbolt spent a while talking about the needs of her patrol and her progress with training the younger members. At the end of their discussion, she commented, "It looks to me like you're down a company captain as of last month. Got anyone in mind for the job yet?"

Fairbolt gave her a fishy stare. After a short pause, he said, "As it happens, you'll be a shoo-in for the job -- just as soon as you return to the patrol from your childbearing years."

Sumac glared. "Not you, too!"

Fairbolt spoke to her about how Massape had managed both childraising and captaining just fine, and how Mari had managed similarly.

Sumac sighed at him. Loudly. After a bit of silence from him, she said, "Do you think I haven't tried to find a husband? I'm not about to bring some fellow into Tent Redwing. Grandmama and Papa would crush most anyone within a day."

Fairbolt grimaced; he made no attempt to deny the problem. "Have you considered moving into your husband's tent, instead of the other way around? Cumbia can only oppose the idea so much, considering she got Omba to do the same."

"Yes. Not many families are willing to consider it. Of those that are, any that are in Hickory or a nearby Camp would get overruled by the head of Tent Redwing and the senior knife maker of the biggest camp in Oleana right quick. It wouldn't be long after that before I was back in Tent Redwing again, you know. As it happens, I've met a couple of men who lived far away and who looked like to agree to me moving into their tents, but it turned out both times that it was because the heads of their own tents were every bit as bad of dragons as Grandmama. I'm not hopping out of the pan just so I can land in the fire, thank you."

Fairbolt sighed. "At least think about it some more; surely there's some way to make things work out."

Sumac left his office shaking her head.

A week passed with no sign of letup, and Sumac was getting desperate. Her own patrol wasn't due to go out again until late winter, so that line of escape was out. More than anything, she needed to get away so she could think things through -- she was still feeling adrift in the middle of the lake, and all this blasted 'get string-bound now' argumentation was no help. So she paid a visit to Fairbolt to find out if there were any exchanges available. In fact, there was one -- a patroller from New Elm in southern Raintree was finishing up his time here and needed a companion for the long journey home. Sumac jumped for it; she left with him barely a week later.


	2. Chapter 2

Arkady woke blearily, surrounded by straw and young farmer boys. _What? Where am I?_ As he woke more fully, the events of the last few days filled his mind. Right, he was in the village of Alligator Hat, in the blacksmith farmer boy's loft. He still couldn't figure out how it had all happened, but his confusion was now running at a different level. _What was I thinking, leaving camp and getting mixed up with farmers?_ Today was the day that he, Dag, Fawn, and Barr, were to set off with all these youngsters and a big mule-drawn wagon to go north. The only reason he could come up with for why he'd slept at all last night was the fact that he'd not slept any the night before, when he was in the Bridger family's farm house. Well, that and the fifteen mile horseback ride he'd taken yesterday to get here.

Once he and the boys climbed down from the loft and entered the Smith family's home, he met up with Dag and Fawn; they had already arrived from the inn they'd spent the night at. If he'd known the choice was available, he'd have stayed there as well. They all sat down to a huge farmhouse breakfast with just as many people as had been present for supper the night before. Afterwards, when they went outside, an additional mob of farmer folk showed up, making a big deal over the young men who were leaving. _Well, I don't think it's as many as showed up that dreadful day in Hatchet Slough._ He began to tone down his alarm when he noticed that Dag was not concerned. _Yeah? With all the fighting Dag's seen, maybe this just means that a mob of farmers isn't as frightening as hundreds of mud-men._ Of course, Barr also wasn't worried, but he'd take all his cues from Dag anyway. Finally Arkady came up with a reason that worked for calming himself down -- namely, Fawn wasn't worried. Not being a patroller, she had much more sense than either of the other two.

As they started out onto the Tripoint Trace and got away from the pressing mass of farmer grounds, he cautiously opened his groundsense. Nowhere in the nearly-a-mile range that he could sense around him could he find any signs of a messenger riding up from New Moon Cutoff's camp council with orders to bring him back home. What was taking them so long, anyway?

It wasn't much more than an hour into their journey that Arkady spotted Dag opening his ground wide. He opened his own ground more fully to watch. Moments later, Dag reached out with his left ground-projection and passed it through the smith-boy's -- Sage's -- head. Taking in farmer ground again. Arkady sighed.

A few minutes later, Dag brought his horse alongside Arkady and Barr. In the ensuing discussion, it became clear that he had no intention of keeping his ground clean; Arkady would simply have to watch and see whether it had been the contamination that had caused Dag's earlier distress. Well, it was true that he was showing no signs of being bothered by the very large amount of ground he'd collected from Finch Bridger's young nephew. The tale he told of their two half-blood riding companions, Calla and Indigo, was troubling. Their father had been a Moss River maker whose farmer wife had died; he had been forced to give them up to his farmer kinfolk in order to be allowed to return to his camp. They weren't accepted by their farmer neighbors and they couldn't live in a Lakewalker camp -- they were stranded between the two worlds. Arkady recalled Dag's tale about the renegade bandit up on the lower Grace River; he'd also given his children up to farmer kinfolk after his own farmer-woman companion died, though it sounded like that situation had turned out far worse than this one had. Such a waste of young lives; surely there was a better answer somewhere.

When they finished riding for the day, they made camp, got supper started, and talked around the fire afterwards. Exhausted, Arkady took his first opportunity to wash up in the nearby stream and headed for his bedroll. As he lay himself down, he opened his ground as wide as he could; no sign of his people yet.

The next morning, Arkady rose from his bedroll wondering if every rock in the world had paid him a visit during the night. Every muscle in his body had a great deal to say about the foolishness of riding twenty miles and then sleeping on bare ground; but just think, he was going to have to do it all again today and tomorrow and.... He reached out with his groundsense again. Still no sign of anyone from New Moon Cutoff coming up to them. Had they decided to just let him leave? After breakfast, he helped Barr with getting his horses ready for travel. He didn't want Dag to think he was shirking -- shortly before bedtime last night, Dag had grabbed a private moment with him and Barr to say a few words about how Arkady needed to take care of his animals himself.

This day's journey was much like yesterday's, except with sorer muscles. When they stopped to camp for the night, Arkady took on part of the job of unloading packsaddles and rubbing down horses; he was content to allow Barr to do the rest, in spite of Dag's comments.

After supper that night, Arkady watched as Calla rose from the campfire to follow Dag in his nightly patrol around their campsite. Curious, he followed her at just enough distance to be sure she wasn't aware of him. The ensuing conversation between her and Dag was enlightening. Yes, she could do -- and had done -- groundwork; yes, she could have gotten accepted into her papa's camp if she'd wanted; no, she didn't want it. True, he didn't want to live in Moss River Camp ever again either, but she didn't have painful memories of a former life there to keep her away. Maybe if they'd been willing to take her brother as well, things might have turned out better for them both. When Dag volunteered him to take on teaching Calla how to manage her groundsense, Arkady decided that he could make good use of the time by investigating solutions to the troubles that plagued half-bloods.

The following morning his muscles were still sore from all the riding, and the rocks had been just as cruel to him as they had the prior night. He reached out again with his groundsense; nobody was chasing him down today, either. Sighing, he turned his mind to the tasks of the day. He was running low on clean clothing. Well, Barr was his senior patrol partner now, so he supposed he'd just ask him what to do.

Once Arkady managed to explain his problem, Barr took him to the stream and gave him a lesson in doing laundry. They only washed socks today; otherwise he'd be packing damp clothes into his bags when it was time to go and everything would end up musty. He would just have to keep wearing not-quite-clean clothing until the first scheduled rest stop a few days from now. Somehow, this was not what he'd been picturing when he'd imagined travel as a broadening experience. When he and Barr returned to their bedrolls to hang their socks on an nearby tree branch to dry, Dag came over to talk about training Calla and Indigo. Arkady pointed out that Dag already had trail-boss duties, so it should be himself and Barr who took on the teaching -- Calla's abilities were clearly maker-oriented and thus well-suited to Arkady's skills, and Indigo's were more along the lines of patrolling and animal care, so Barr was a natural choice for him.

That arranged, they ate breakfast, got their horses ready, gathered up their socks and other gear, and started off.

Around mid-morning, Arkady came over to Sage and Calla's wagon. "Good day to you."

Calla looked down at the boards under her feet. She didn't answer. Sage, however, asked, "Are you here to teach Calla how to use her magic?"

Arkady smiled at him. "Yes, in fact."

Calla still said nothing. Sage asked, "Can I watch? Would you be willing to explain it all to me?"

"Certainly. You won't be able to do the exercises, but it's a good idea to have a clear sense of what Calla can and can't do with her abilities."

The first lessons in the use of groundsense required that she be relaxed. Tense as she was now, Arkady figured he'd do best to spend some time explaining groundsense and answering questions. Arkady began with the basic explanations of ground and groundsense. Sage asked a few questions, which Arkady answered willingly enough.

After a few minutes, Calla finally spoke. "Why are you doing this?"

Arkady answered, "Because you need the training and I have plenty of time to give it to you."

She frowned. It wasn't quite a scowl, but it wasn't that far short. "No other Lakewalker's ever wanted to train me no matter how much I maybe need it. Why are you really doing this? Why is Barr over there teaching Indigo? Why are you two and Dag so interested in us?"

Arkady looked over to her. "I would say that the folk of Moss River were remiss in failing to teach you and your brother. I don't care to compound their error; since I have a chance to rectify that mistake, I would like to do so. I am also looking to learn more about the needs of half-bloods; teaching you will give me a good chance to do so."

"If you're planning to take me to Moss River; I can tell you right now I won't go."

Arkady's mouth crimped. "I don't intend to do that; I'd rather not go there myself, to be honest. I've told you why I'm helping you. As for Barr, well, partly he's interested in learning more about farmers and half-bloods, too; also, if Dag told him to hop like a frog, the only question he'd ask is 'how high?' As to Dag himself.... It's a bit more complicated with him; everything is complicated with him, as far as I can tell. Certainly he wants to learn about half-bloods, too. In addition, he's trying to fix the world; your troubles are a part of what he feels needs fixing. Mostly, though, he sees you as being like himself, I think."

"How so? He's a northern full-blood; he's way more powerful with his magic than I'll ever be; he's much older than me; he's traveled all over. We don't have anything in common that I see."

Arkady blew out his breath. "He's exiled from his folk, who strongly disapprove of his marriage, and as a result he doesn't quite fit into either the Lakewalker world or the farmer world. Further, he developed some very powerful groundworking abilities only recently, and his kinfolk failed to teach him anything about them. He spent last fall desperately trying to make sense of what was happening to him and did himself a great deal of harm in the process. That's not so different from what's been happening with you, I think."

She looked down; Sage reached over and squeezed her hand. He asked, "If you taught Calla how to do this ... groundwork, as you call it ... would she be able to do it with my metal work? Make it stronger, or not rust, or keep its edges longer, or some such?"

Arkady looked over to him. "I don't know; it depends on where her talents lie. Calla, when you handle string, cloth, wood, metal, clay, or any other such thing, do you sometimes think you can feel what it really is inside? Or think you can make it be more the way it should be?"

She shook her head. "No ... not much like that, really. Mostly just with..." She trailed off.

Arkady smiled slightly. "Mostly with people, yes?"

She looked away.

He said, "In fact, that's a sign of medicine-making abilities. Very useful for treating illnesses or injuries, particularly in children. I'd take pride in that, if I were you."

She and Sage looked at each other. They both smiled slightly. She looked as if she just might be willing to acknowledge her ground abilities, after all. Arkady decided to start with some basic techniques in learning control. About a half-hour passed pleasantly enough.

When she showed signs of tiring, Arkady broke off the lessons. They talked a bit more, then he mentioned, "It seems to me that the Moss River folk should never have forced your papa to give you and your brother up. He should have been allowed to bring you both into the camp to live with him."

Calla shook her head. "Oh? And would the Lakewalkers there have accepted us? How would they have treated us? Would we have had friends, or would we be able to marry Lakewalkers someday?"

Arkady sighed. "Likely not." He paused a bit. "I suppose there's more than one problem to solve here -- making them agree to take in half-bloods is not enough by itself."

He promised to come by the next day to continue the lessons, and rode forward to speak some with Dag.

After a few more days had passed, Arkady gave up on looking for his people to come after him. If they were going to chase him down, then so be it; meanwhile, he was learning quite a bit about farmers and patrolling and life on the road in general. He could take care of his horses; he'd mostly gotten used to washing up morning and night in cold streams; he'd learned to do various evening chores like washing the supper dishes and collecting firewood; and his muscles had grown used to riding. He still didn't enjoy feeling rocks under his bedroll every night, though.

His groundsense lessons with Calla were coming along reasonably well, too. On the first day, she'd greeted him with about the joy she'd have given to a scorpion sitting beside her; over time, she'd concluded that he didn't plan to spirit her off to Moss River and had begun to relax in his presence. She was still suspicious of his motives, but even that was fading.

They'd been traveling for nearly a week when the clear weather broke up. The rain started in early morning; by midmorning it was getting heavy. Arkady rode over to Dag to ask what they were going to do about the weather. Dag stared at him. "We'll ride in it. A bit of wet isn't going to hurt anyone." Right. Another broadening experience, to be sure.

Shortly after their lunch break, the wagon got stuck in a deep mud puddle. The back right wheel was almost half-buried in muck and the back left one was partly sunken as well. Dag and some of the farmer boys went off to collect branches to put in front of the wheels. When they returned, Arkady came over to Dag with the intention of pointing out the folly of trying to ride in the rain. Unfortunately, when he arrived, Dag ordered Arkady to join him and Barr in wading into the puddle to help push the wagon out. He stared in disbelief. Surely not!

Surely yes. Standing a bit more than knee-deep in mud pushing on a very slimy wagon with heavy rain pouring down all around was not on the list of tasks Arkady had figured on learning how to do on this mad journey, but here he was doing just that. With Fawn, Calla, and Indigo at the front encouraging the mules and the farmer boys at the other hind wheel in a shallower portion of the puddle, he helped push the wagon forward until it had at least somewhat firmer ground under it. When they resumed their journey, Arkady spent some time looking for a stream to wash himself off at. He wanted to climb out of his skin. The first one they found was swollen brown and running very fast; it was also too wide and deep for the wagon to ride safely across. Arkady hadn't found anything better to clean himself at, so he spent a few minutes washing the mud off his hands, arms, and face. His clothing would have to wait. At this stream, he learned how to help warp the wagon across the river with ropes. They repeated the exercise near evening; at this point, Arkady was sure he'd been broadened as far as he ever needed to be. He was exhausted, and his bath barrel was calling him; unfortunately, he was much too far away for it to be any help now. They slept under the wagon that night.

The next afternoon, they went a few miles aside from the Trace to spend some time at the home of Ash Tanner's uncle. Arkady was looking forward to a genuine day of rest at this point. He smiled that night when he saw he would be able to sleep in a loft instead of on the ground. It made for a big improvement over last night, anyway. Thinking about how much his opinions had changed, he shook his head in wonder. A week ago, he'd thought a straw pile in a loft was a big step down from his comfortable bed at home.

The following day the sun was hiding again; light rain misted around. First thing after breakfast, Barr accompanied him to the nearby stream so they could wash their clothing and hang it over some empty stall partitions in the barn. Next, Barr led him behind the barn to teach him how to clean tack. This was a rest day? Arkady was content to watch and stay out of Barr's way, though he supposed he'd be having to do the task himself at their next rest stop.

Halfway through the lesson, Dag and Fawn showed up. Dag had come up with a way to make his ground shield idea work, and he and Fawn wanted to test it. It was successful, as far as they all could tell. Suddenly, Arkady decided that he didn't care how many mud puddles Dag planned to order him to walk into -- it was worth it if he could be a part of healing the world.

They reached the Barrens a few days later. He'd visited there once before for a day during his second -- and last -- practice patrol when he was a youngster at Hatchet Slough. The land still felt sad and half-empty to him, but at least this time he understood more clearly why it troubled him; its ground was only part-recovered from having been blighted so many centuries ago.

It took two weeks to travel through the Barrens; Arkady was glad when the world's ground began filling out again, gradually regaining its normal deep texture and beauty. One evening, when they were nearly out of the Barrens, they camped in a pleasant-looking valley with plenty of uncropped grass for the mules to eat.

They soon discovered why previous travelers had failed to camp there; there were rattlers everywhere. When Barr spoke of the need to be careful waking up in snake country when other patrollers were around, Arkady saw a smile flash across Dag's face. He promptly decided two things: First, if Dag was planning the sort of thing Arkady thought he might be planning -- apprentices were all alike in some regards -- Arkady would do well to think out just how to teach him not to try tricks on his mentor. And second, he'd better get a lesson from Barr on how to wake carefully.

He had no sooner begun to work out a plan of action, when Dag changed his mind and decided to take care of the problem with a patroller snake drive. Arkady'd taken part in one only once before; it was during his very first practice patrol over forty years ago. That time, they'd flushed a grand total of three snakes, only one of which was actually venomous. He'd never heard about anyone driving hundreds of snakes off before, but it wasn't like this was difficult groundwork. Within an hour, they had all the area around their campsite cleared of the rattlers. Shortly before bed time, Arkady found a private moment to ask Barr about waking carefully. Just in case some creature paid him a visit in the night.


	3. Chapter 3

After a mild winter season down in New Elm, Sumac's exchange was coming to an end. It had been a quiet time, with no emergencies of any sort. She was still disoriented; she didn't want to think about returning home. She supposed the uproar would be quieted down by now, but there would still be no Uncle Dag and there would still be long-winded complaints about her continued failure to get string-bound. She had to admit her tent-kin had one thing right; if things continued as they'd been for the last fifteen years, she would be skipping out on marriage and children entirely. This wasn't what she wanted, but there was no way she'd bring children into Grandmama's tent unless matters changed a lot.

Her failure hadn't been for lack of looking. In fact, several men here had tried to catch her interest. One of the two company captains was recently widowed, and he might possibly have worked out, but it was plain he and his family expected he would travel north with her if he caught her. She couldn't see him successfully fending off her Grandmama alone, much less Grandmama and Papa working together, so she didn't encourage him.

She'd spent the winter training the local patrollers in northern fighting techniques and in ground-veiling. They were much improved over when she'd first arrived, and one young man showed real promise. Rase Poplar was a bit young for exchanging north, being barely nineteen. All the same, there was no doubt he could be a fine patrol leader or maybe even a company captain once he got some real experience under his belt. As the end of her season in the camp approached along with the time for the spring migration, she spoke with him about coming north for an exchange of his own. Within a week, the enthusiastic young man had gotten permission from his family, was granted his first primed knife from their small collection, and had acquired a horse of his own. Sumac helped him choose the horse; there were two that he was considering, but if he got the better horse, his family would not be able to provide him with a bow as well. She told him that Hickory Lake would provide a bow for his use just fine and it wouldn't take that long saving up to be able to buy one of his own. Further, a good horse could well make the difference between life and death in a battle. He got the better horse, choosing to do without a bow for the time being.

So it was that shortly before spring migration, Sumac and Rase began their trip north-east. One benefit of exchanging to other camps was that the journeying generally replaced having to take part in that big to-do. The first leg of their journey was much more east than north; they followed the trail just north of the Barrens heading for Mutton Hash; their plan was to cross the Hardboil river at the ferry there and take the Tripoint Trace north.

One morning not long before they would be approaching Mutton Hash, Sumac spotted a group of men lurking just about the distance of her groundsense range -- a bit short of a mile -- away. She directed Rase to veer onto a small trail that was headed southeast so they could reach the Trace sooner, and further south, than they would otherwise have done. By early afternoon, she was confident they'd left the men behind, and decided to look for a suitable place for lunch. As they approached a small river near a likely ford, they found a great many rattlesnakes lying drowned or half-drowned among the rocks.

Rase stared, then said, "I've never seen anything like that before. Have you? Do you suppose there was a flood?"

Sumac shook her head. "Can't say as I have. Can't be a flood, though -- the grassy plants alongside the river aren't flattened, there aren't any large branches hung up in the water, and there aren't any other dead animals around. Folks do say the Barrens are a mighty strange place."

They led their horses a ways down the river to a place where it flowed clear, and allowed them to drink their fill.

Sumac then said, "Recently as those snakes must've died, I'm not thinking we'd want to chance eating their meat without knowing more about why it happened. Still, the skins are valuable, and if we collect a bunch and sell them at Mutton Hash, we'll be able to buy supplies there for the trip north. Best make sure they're dead, first, though -- use your groundsense."

So the two of them returned to the ford and began collecting snakes. After a few minutes, Rase shouted; the snake he'd just grabbed by the middle hadn't been dead after all and was swinging its head toward his hand. Still thoroughly chilled by its time in the river, it moved slowly enough for Rase to drop it and stomp its head without getting bitten. He jumped around and swore for a bit; after he got over the shock, he informed Sumac that he'd collected as many snakes as he wanted. About ten minutes later, Sumac concluded that she'd gotten all the rest of the ones that were worth collecting.

They ate lunch, skinned the snakes, and resumed their journey. The Trace was only a few miles on; they reached it with no further adventures, and began the northern leg of their travels. The road was in better condition than the trail they'd been following; they made good speed through the afternoon. As evening approached, Sumac decided that they would continue about another ten miles today; that way, they could reach Mutton Hash by early evening the next day. They'd sell their snakeskins, buy some supplies, and spend the night there, being sure to catch an early ride on the ferry the following morning.

About two miles later, they passed a mule-drawn wagon; there were several horse riders in front of it. One of them looked startlingly like her Uncle Dag; he was even riding a red horse that looked just like old Copperhead. His ground didn't really match her uncle's, though; for one thing, it was mostly open -- he never had his own ground more than half-open when anyone was nearby. She forced herself to stop staring at him so she could pay attention to the road.

Blight, but that reminded her of another reason she didn't much want to go home. She'd spent her life looking up to her uncle and trying to follow in his footsteps. With him gone for good, what was she to do? _Oh, Uncle Dag, where are you? How can I follow you when I don't know where you've gone?_ She still felt uncomfortably unattached -- there just wasn't much at Hickory Lake to draw her heart.

The man called out, "Sumac!" and reached to her with a ground-touch. But he couldn't possibly be her uncle! She stopped her horse and wheeled around. When he waved a hook in the air, all her doubts vanished -- she recognized Uncle Dag's patrol signal immediately.

Calling back, "Uncle Dag!", she trotted back to him. Rase followed right behind her, obviously confused.

Sumac didn't know how it was possible that he'd be on the road this far south, but she didn't much care -- she was too glad to see him. They chatted cheerfully, and she even managed to tell him the tale of how his coat saved her life in battle last spring. Just as the tale ended, another Lakewalker turned off the road and joined them. He was a young blond patroller; good-looking as such things went. At that point, Sumac abruptly realized Uncle Dag already had two companions. One was a handsome, well-dressed, surprisingly neat Lakewalker with his ground wide-open and who was probably close to Uncle Dag in age; he was plainly a medicine maker, but she'd never seen anyone with a ground so dense. The other was a tiny, very cute farmer girl whose ground appeared even stranger -- it was as if Sumac would see it better if she cleared the gunk out of her eyes, except that of course her eyes weren't how she was seeing it. Presumably this was the wife who'd gotten everyone back home into such a frenzy. She seemed too small to have produced so much ruckus....

The farmer girl spoke up at this point. "Is that your old magic coat that was supposed to turn arrows, Dag?"

Sumac reckoned this was the best chance she'd ever get to learn more about this girl and about how her uncle had changed so much. She confirmed it was the same coat, providing enough details to show that she was willing to be friendly to a farmer girl. In a bit, Sumac's curiosity won over her courtesy. Glances at her new Aunt Fawn's ground weren't getting her any closer to figuring it out, so she broke down and asked, "What in the world is wrong with her ground?"

Dag answered. "Nothing. It's a little experiment of mine. A ground shield for farmers."

Since when was Dag any kind of maker? "Groundwork? _You?_ "

All he said was, "It's a long tale."

Fortunately for Sumac's curiosity, Fawn spoke up. "Dag's studying to be a medicine maker. Arkady here is teaching him. He's a real respected groundsetter from the south."

 _What?_ Sumac stared in shock. Well.... She supposed that explained some of the changes in his ground. He was recently string-bound, he'd traveled to the south, he was learning medicine making. Oh, yes, and he'd been badly injured in his ground last summer; no doubt that explained the dark marks in it. Her best guess was that it would take a deal more to explain all the changes in her uncle fully. No question there was a tale to be learned here.

Meanwhile, Uncle Dag's medicine maker companion smiled slightly and introduced himself. "Arkady Waterbirch New Moon Cutoff, at your service."

She managed to nod reasonably politely despite her shock. "Maker Waterbirch." Hm. A top-notch maker who not only doesn't mind Uncle Dag having a farmer-girl wife, but who also doesn't mind going traveling quite a long distance with him. Almost all the makers she'd ever known only traveled when it was time for the migration. Only a few minor makers even took up trading journeys -- mostly they left that to the patrollers to do. As far as she could tell, he didn't seem to be string-bound; certainly there were no signs of a wife or children -- or grandchildren, around.

The young patroller who'd joined them made it known that he wanted to be introduced as well. Uncle Dag introduced him as Barr from Pearl Riffle Camp. She introduced Rase in turn, and they chatted some more. After a few moments, a fellow who'd been with the wagon came riding back. He was a half-blood; the others around the wagon had been farmers. He called out, "Dag? Are you coming, or should we wait for you, or what?"

Dag let him know he'd be coming. Sumac stared at the wagon. He was traveling with farmers? When Dag asked if she'd care to join them, she took him up on it.

They talked some more as they rode up the road to his campsite; then, once they had a fire going and dinner made, they told each other their tales. Sumac learned more about last summer's events and about his journey down the river with farmer boatfolk; from the sounds of it, she was now kin to an entire clan of farmers. They sounded like good folk, though. Their fight with river bandits -- yes, Dag's luck continued as vile as always; it didn't look like life was planning to lighten up on him just because he wasn't attached to Hickory Lake any more. They described their stay at New Moon Cutoff more briefly -- his teacher Maker Waterbirch spoke some at this point. Finally, they explained how they got mixed up with yet more farmers and described their journey north. She stole glances at her uncle off and on through their tale; no wonder his ground was so changed. _So, now I know where he is, but how do I follow these footsteps?_

They were awakened the following almost-morning by a strong thunderstorm. Interestingly, Maker Waterbirch not only took care of his own horses, he also made himself useful by sending out persuasions to calm the rest of the animals as well. Once they had their gear all gathered up and the lightning show was over with, they set off. Sumac spoke with Rase just as they set out, telling him that they might as well stick with the group until the ferry. Rase was visibly confused about their new companions, and about whether they even should be spending time with them, but he agreed to do so for the time being, anyway.


	4. Chapter 4

Arkady rode in front with Dag and his niece Sumac today. This made the third time that he'd had to travel in heavy rain, and he'd been annoyed to have to be out in such dreadful weather the other times, but today he didn't mind at all. In fact, the only times he was troubled by the wet was when the rainfall was too heavy to allow conversation. According to Dag, Sumac was not an easy catch to make -- between his description of her prior suitors as forming a "String of Bodies" and his naming her papa to be a man who crushed unworthy suitors, he figured he'd been given fair warning. Caution seemed a good watchword here; he decided that watching and listening before acting and speaking would be the best strategy.

At the end of the day, they paid a local farmer to be allowed to spend the night in his broken-down old barn. Before lying down, Arkady walked over to Calla in her wagon. "My apologies for not coming by today; I'll make sure I don't forget tomorrow."

Calla smirked at him. "That's all right -- I just tried some of the sensitivity drills you showed me before. I'm guessing you've found something better to do!"

He flushed slightly. "I won't forget you tomorrow; I'll come by a bit before lunch or maybe in the early afternoon." He walked over to his straw pile, wondering how many folks were making guesses about him.

When they started off the following morning, he waited until Barr and Rase were talking animatedly with each other. At that point, he brought his horse closer to Sumac. Before he could speak, though, she said, "Maybe we could get some time away from these children by slowing up and letting the wagon pass us. Interested?"

He nodded, and they moved over to the verge to allow the riders and the wagon to pass. Once they were out of range of its dust, they returned to the road pacing along slowly. At first he limited his questions to her usual activities in the patrol. When she mentioned that she regularly went to the hinterland meetings, he asked, "How is it that you go to those? I thought only company captains could serve as hinterland lieutenants."

Her mouth crimped. "I'm not a lieutenant; Iwassa and Rig bring me so I can be their scribe. It's because of my neat handwriting, which is Uncle Dag's fault! You see, he used to do a deal of studying patrol reports, but most folk who write them aren’t at all neat. Uncle Dag has had a lot to say about why some folk even bother writing anything at all if they can't write neat enough that folk like him can make sense of any of it. After hearing his comments, I decided to work on being neat. As a punishment, I get to spend every other summer listening to a lot of captains arguin' over which sectors are worse than which other ones and who should have to take the worst ones this time."

After a pause, she commented, "I don't see makers on the road too often. I'd think the folk at your camp, especially your kin, would be missing you by now. Are you planning to return south soon?"

He looked across at her. "A short answer is that Dag needs me more than they do. He's not nearly far enough along in his training to survive on his own as a medicine maker for Lakewalkers, much less for farmers. The folks at New Moon wouldn't allow him to return, so I'm traveling with him."

"And a long answer?"

He looked down this time. "That gets personal pretty quickly." He thought a moment. "Tell you what; how about if we trade? I'll answer personal questions if I can ask you a few of my own."

Sumac gave him a wry smile. "I'm thinking I'd be willing to match you there. I'll go along."

He spent a moment putting his thoughts together. "I have no kinfolk at New Moon. I originally came from a smaller camp maybe a bit more than two hundred miles south of here, called Hatchet Slough."

Sumac nodded. "I know where it is; I've exchanged once at a camp not that far from it."

Arkady shook his head. She might not have Dag's breadth of travel, but she was well out of his own league. "I had to leave when I was twenty-three." He paused, then he added, "I'd been recently string-bound to a woman named Bryna Snapping Turtle; she was also training to become a medicine maker." He told Sumac about their disastrous attempt at healing farmers, and how they'd had to be smuggled out in the night at the end of it. "They sent us to Moss River, New Moon's sister camp, because there was a groundsetter in residence there -- I was already showing signs that I would develop the potential once I grew into myself. The camp council told us how we'd been going to be sent there eventually anyway, so we shouldn't think of this as banishment. It wasn't that far off as far as we were concerned, though -- I've never seen anyone from my family since."

"Had you been close to them?"

"Yes, and close to Bryna's family as well. But one moves on as best one can. We were so desperate to show our worth to the folk at Moss River, to make up for that dreadful mistake. We worked very hard to be accepted. We did a lot of traveling in those days, actually. My mentor Haldar had a custom of alternating between Moss River and New Moon; he'd live one year at one place, and the next year at the other. We made the twenty-mile journey between the camps with him for almost fifteen years."

"Why did you stop traveling? As I understand it, you've been living only at New Moon Cutoff for some time now."

After a bit of silence, Arkady described the difficulties he and Bryna had had with failed pregnancies and his disastrous attempts to correct the problems. "Not that long after we gave up trying to have children, Bryna asked to cut strings so she could try again with someone else before she grew too old to bear. We decided that I would move to New Moon Cutoff while she remained at Moss River. Haldar also decided to stay at Moss River so both camps would have resident groundsetters. He was getting too old to travel much anyway. And so, I've been on my own for about twenty years."

"Haven't you been lonely?"

Arkady shrugged. "I've generally had one or two apprentices to keep me busy. It's hard to feel lonely when some young fool is trying to get killed being a hero." This was reminding him too much of Sutaw.

"You only have Uncle Dag now, is that right? I suppose you were between apprentices when you started up with him, then."

"Yes." He paused for about a minute. She waited. He told her how his previous apprentice, Sutaw, had died. "After that, I wasn't sure I wanted any more apprentices, if I couldn't keep a close enough eye on them to prevent such troubles. My tent was much quieter for the next two months until Dag arrived."

Sumac rode quietly beside him for a little bit. "I remember my first time with something like that, shortly after I became a patrol leader. There was this boy in my patrol; maybe eighteen years old. We went out to a sector up in the swampy areas below the Dead Lake and met up with a malice. It had a batch of mud-men, and it had gone off sessile maybe a month before we met up with it. The boy's papa was famous at Hickory Lake for a particularly spectacular malice kill some years before, and I suppose he was eager to prove he could do just as well. The fool boy didn't even have a knife, but he spotted a gap in the mud-man ring around the lair and ran over to the malice anyway. It grabbed him and flung him around against the walls of its lair like he was some farmer child's rag doll. When we returned home, I brought one thigh bone to his family -- the other had been broken into several pieces. His family understood, and tried to make it easier for me, but I felt pretty awful about it for some time. I didn't much want to be a patrol leader for a good while after. It's happened a couple more times since; you never get used to telling the family that you failed their child."

He asked her, "How do you manage it? How often does that sort of thing happen in the north, anyway?"

She frowned. "For how often -- it depends. Northern patrols tend to lose a patroller every few years or so on average. In quiet times, it's less; in less-quiet times, it's not.... It's not as bad when it was a difficult battle and the patroller who got killed had been doing his duty as best he could, like the second time for me. One expects such things to happen sometimes. It's hardest when you have a young patroller who died doing something stupid, because part of the job of a patrol leader is to prevent that sort of thing. You train them to know what works and what doesn't; you get them partnered with someone who can keep an eye on them; and so forth. But too often, they still manage it. I just remember that I'm good at leading patrols, even if it doesn't seem so just then, and that other patrol leaders make the same mistakes. Also, I use the experience to learn how to do better. From that boy, I learned to beware when a youngster talks too enthusiastically about heroic family members. For all we praise heroes in our songs, we need to train patrollers not to try to do the same."

Arkady sighed. They rode quietly for a few minutes.

After a bit, she asked, "I'd think the folk in your camp would be upset by your being gone. Why haven't they come after you? Do you plan to return to them soon? Are they actually so mad at Uncle Dag that they won't take you back if you're with him?"

Arkady'd been wondering the same thing for some time now. "I didn't think they'd take so long, I admit. They ought to be able to find me if they try; it's not like I've gone into hiding. Well, if they want me, they can come get me; otherwise, I'm staying with Dag."

After a bit, Arkady said, "From what I've seen of your ground, you'd be an excellent maker. Why'd you choose the patrol?"

Sumac rolled her eyes up to the sky. "That describes my Papa's and Grandmama's thoughts exactly! Only you need to add a good deal of complaint to the question, and a lot of suggestion that even now I could change my mind and take up knife making or some such skill."

Arkady saw her ground darkening and sent a nearby butterfly over to land on her nose. She laughed and freed one of her hands to send it off to find flowers again.

He then said, "I take it they don't approve of your being in the patrol. You're very successful at it, though, if you're looking to be a company captain. Are they afraid you'll end up killed or badly hurt?"

Sumac sighed. "Well, some.... Mama worries, but she doesn't want to stop me; she understands about the patrol. Certainly Grandmama is good at coming up with more ways I could end up killed than anyone else I've known. Mostly, though, with her, it's just everything about patrolling. She doesn't like the fact that patrollers spend so much time away from camp and their kin, she doesn't like the danger, she doesn't like the way we spend so much time together training, and.... Mostly, she thinks it's a bad thing to be a patroller. Because patrollers believe there's nothing more important than doing their duty for the patrol. She's right that we're like that, but -- I suppose you've never seen a malice, have you?"

Arkady shook his head. "We don't get them much in the south. Also, I only did a few practice patrols when I was young; I didn't enjoy being out in the woods and learning to fight."

"You see, if patrollers stop doing their duty and start just staying home, there won't be enough of us to deal with malices. Once you see one, you know they're just plain wrong. The world needs to be rid of 'em. You can't not go and fight them. And you can't be string-bound to someone who doesn't understand this. Grandmama.... It's not that she doesn't understand, exactly; it's more like she understands but believes it's bad even so."

"And what does your papa think?"

Sumac frowned. "Papa disapproves for different reasons. He has this nice clean way of looking at the world. All makers are better than all patrollers, even minor makers versus company captains. Among makers, there are the general crafts, then there's medicine making, and then on top there's knife making. He thinks it's a huge waste of my talent to be a patrol leader instead of a knife maker."

"Ah. And just where does he rank groundsetters?"

"Well, Hickory Lake hasn't had one in more than a hundred years, so he hasn't had to think about that. Actually, I'm not sure there are any to be found in any Oleana camp. I think he'd try to argue that groundsetters are just particularly good medicine makers. I doubt he'd appreciate that most folk in camp wouldn't agree with him on that count."

"So why did you choose the patrol?"

She took a deep breath. "The short answer is Uncle Dag."

"And a long answer?"

"The long answer is still Uncle Dag, but I explain more about what he's been to me." She paused, frowning a bit. "When I was little, he was the uncle who was away on a walk around the lake; only the best patrollers take walks around the lake, so when he would return -- as of course he would -- he'd become a company captain and then a hinterland lieutenant, likely. A true credit to Tent Redwing. Then he sent word that he was going to stay in Luthlia and not come back. Grandmama was already making it clear I was to be a maker and uphold the dignity of Tent Redwing; whenever she got too unpleasant, I wished I could be like him -- away."

She paused for a moment and sighed. "Then we got word about Wolf Ridge; how he'd won a great battle and he'd be remembered forever as a great captain. And, oh by the way, he was injured in the battle and wouldn't ever be able to patrol again. A couple years later, some of his surviving tent kin brought him back to Hickory Lake because he wasn't recovering; he wasn't able to take care of himself and they had too difficult of lives to keep him on and he might maybe do better away from the bad memories. They told us we shouldn't ever speak of the Wolf War, or his lost wife, or really anything about Luthlia at all around him, because it was too distressing to him. That pretty much ruled out talking about anything from his life in the last eight or so years, so there wasn't much to speak about with him. Not that he spoke much anyway. There were many days when he never said a word."

Arkady commented, "That was a dreadful battle. Does that sort of thing happen often in the north?"

She shook her head. "No. Maybe once every fifty years in Luthlia; it's rarer south of the lake. Still, you never really know."

"I've wondered.... Knowing what happened to Dag, how is it you want to be a company captain?"

"I'm good at the patrol; definitely good enough that I can do captaining well. We need good folk for the job; if nobody takes the risk, then it doesn't happen and malices destroy the world. In Dag's case, for all Papa and Grandmama were always riding him about his being 'just a patroller,' and not agreeing to be promoted again, it's seemed to me that he's done that duty well enough -- he's earned the right to do as he chooses in the patrol. If what happened to him ever happened to me, I reckon I'd be doing plenty well enough if I could do the same as he's done and be content with being just a patroller."

Again, she paused. "When he first arrived from Luthlia, he was skeleton-thin. It turned out that he only ate if someone reminded him to do it; otherwise he just sat and ignored his food. He couldn't do his hair, either -- it was still long then. I got the jobs of reminding him to eat and braiding his hair in the mornings and making him wash up. Since I couldn't talk to him about him, I told him about me. My older brother said how he didn't think Uncle Dag wanted to hear about the doings of fifteen-year-old girls, but I didn't have anything else I could say, so I kept it up. There was a night later, when Uncle Dag told me that he didn't mind at all; it distracted him from all his 'if only' thinking."

Her ground was darkening again; Arkady suspected that there was some unpleasant tale surrounding that conversation. He sent a sparrow over to her; it landed on her horse's mane and peeped at her. She laughed again.

She resumed her tale, saying, "When Fairbolt took him to Tripoint and got him that arm harness, he cut his hair short and began working constantly to get in shape to patrol. He found lots of ways to do tasks like climbing trees and tying his horse and fighting with hand-and-hook. Folks were sure Fairbolt was asking for trouble letting him into his company; Dag'd be a hindrance to others and they'd have to endanger themselves coming to his rescue all the time. Instead, Uncle Dag was soon the best patroller in the camp. He doesn't let anyone tell him what he is or isn't able to do; he makes the impossible happen and he makes it look easy. I want to be like that, too." Her ground glowed with reflected pride at this point of her tale.

After few minutes, Arkady asked, "What happened that time you spoke of, when Dag said he didn't mind hearing about the doings of fifteen-year-old girls?"

She looked over to him. "I suppose I still owe you some personal answers. But it's hard talking about that day; I really hate it when I complain about Grandmama -- I sound too much like her."

Arkady brought over another sparrow. "I could provide distractions."

"I might need many. But all right. This was maybe two months after Uncle Dag arrived; I was going to go on my first 'real' practice patrol -- we were going to do real pattern walks and we were going to spend a whole week of the time in an area that was more than a day's walk from camp. I was so proud to be allowed to take part in that patrol so soon after I started the basic training. I was telling Uncle Dag about it while I was keeping him at the task of eating dinner. He looked like he might even be enjoying the tale; he didn't smile or say anything, but he looked straight at me."

She paused a moment; her ground darkened considerably. Arkady sent two butterflies over to land on her horse's mane and her hand. She chuckled. "Soon there won't be any for the blossoms!" She sent them back to the flowers and resumed her tale, saying, "Grandmama interrupted me, saying that I wasn't to be a patroller and I oughtn't be looking forward to these rough patrols. Further, she couldn't see why I would want to do them at all, seeing as how in the patrol I might get killed or else I'd be hurt bad and then I'd end up crazy and useless like Dag."

Arkady sent a red-crest to her horse this time. Sumac shook her head. He sent a goldfinch flying around her head a few times, then it landed by the red-crest.

After she sent them away, she resumed her tale. "He got up and started walking out of the tent. He did that sometimes when he didn't like what folks were saying. I was so mad. I'd just started getting him eating and now he was going to have almost no dinner. I yelled at Grandmama, saying it was a terrible thing she said and she ought to take it back. Uncle Dag stopped walking out and turned around towards me. I think he was going to say something, but then Grandmama hauled me out back behind the tent. It'd been several years since the last time she'd beaten me -- all I can reckon is she must've been saving up for this one. It was memorable. Finally, she sent me to my bedroll saying I wasn't to eat or leave the bedroll until I apologized to her. I was too furious to even consider it."

Arkady shook his head. "I suppose she was embarrassed; didn't want to admit she was wrong."

Sumac sighed. "She's not ever been one to admit anything. Anyway, after I calmed down some, Uncle Dag asked Grandmama to allow him to talk in private with me. She didn't much want to agree, but he pointed out that this was about him and he'd like to see if he could help. So she let us go out to the dock to talk, though she said I wasn't to go anywhere else and when we were done, I was to go straight back to the bedroll. We sat out there looking at the lake; there was a nearly-full moon, so we could see well enough. We talked a while. I don't think he'd said more than ten words that whole week, but we spoke a long time then. Eventually he said I'd have to apologize to Grandmama. Funny. She'd not managed to make me cry even a bit, but then it just broke out."

This time he suggested they pause and walk around the nearby meadow a bit -- they could catch up with the others easily enough. They walked among the grasses, avoiding the too-muddy spots, and he collected up some daisies and other flowers. He strung them together -- not the usual daisy-chain way, but by groundwork, to convince the stems that they belonged together -- then he gave her the loop to place around her head, like a crown. She did so, laughing. After a bit, they returned to the road and resumed the journey. She placed the loop carefully on top of her saddle-bags, held in place so it wouldn't fall, and where she could see them clearly if she turned to look.

She said, "When I calmed down again, I asked how he could want me to do that after the terrible things she'd said about him. He said that at least with her he knew what she thought. Did I really think folk in other tents weren't saying the exact same things, only behind his back instead? I'd heard some of that, so I couldn't say he was wrong. I asked if he really was crazy; he said he thought not, or leastways not any more. He was just frustrated with being useless; he needed to have something worthwhile to do, and there just wasn't anything. Then he switched back to talking about apologizing; he pointed out that I'd have to eat eventually, and Grandmama's word was law in the tent, so I couldn't win this one -- a smart tactician knows what battles not to fight. He also pointed out that listening to that beating hadn't done him a bit of good. After a bit, I agreed that I could honestly say I was sorry, so long as what I was actually apologizing for was having distressed him. That worked well enough, so we went in and that was all. I went out on the practice patrol two days later, and by the time I got back from it, Fairbolt had taken him to Tripoint."

They were approaching Mutton Hash at this point, so they broke off their conversation. It was an astonishingly large and bustling settlement to Arkady's eyes. Dag had said that Graymouth was actually larger, as were the main farmer cities to the north, but he couldn't imagine how so many folk could stand to be packed so closely together. As they approached the town, Sumac told Arkady that she needed to find Rase so they could sell their snakeskins.

Once she'd trotted forward ahead of the wagon to where Fawn and the other patrollers were talking together, Arkady decided that the best use of his time would be to resume Calla's lessons. He rode up to the wagon and began the day's range-development drill. Her task today was to try to hold awareness of as many things in her range -- maybe thirty paces -- as she could.

They reached the town a few minutes later. There was a line waiting to cross the ferry, so they moved to its end to await their turn. All around him, there were folks selling an astonishing variety of goods; there was even a fiddler entertaining the crowd for coins.

As Arkady continued the lesson, he noted that Calla was coming along well -- she was managing to hold awareness of the grounds of all of their companions at the same time. Abruptly Fawn's ground flashed brightly -- Arkady and Calla both saw her reaction. Normally, it was impossible to make anything out of Fawn's ground because her shield concealed all the details, but this was such a strong response that even Calla could tell that she was excited, astonished, and glad.

They broke off the lesson and watched as Fawn cried out, "Berry!", and hopped down from her horse. _What was this?_ Thinking things over, Arkady recalled that Berry was the name of Fawn's tent-sister. But he'd understood that Dag and Fawn's farmer family had taken a keelboat upriver heading for Tripoint; why would they be here?

Dag and Barr, both obviously delighted, joined her in front of the fiddler. Whatever the reason, clearly they were here; Arkady expected he'd learn more about how this came about soon enough.


	5. Chapter 5

During the ferry crossing to the northern part of Mutton Hash, Sumac learned that Dag and Fawn's farmer family were renting space at a nearby farm. Since their own animals could do with a rest, they made arrangements to stay there for a day before continuing their journey.

The following afternoon, Sumac looked on curiously as Dag's tent-brother Whit showed off a farmer-made crossbow he'd recently acquired. When he and the other farmer boys went to the edge of their pasture campsite to practice with it, Sumac and Rase hung back along the fence to watch along with Dag, Arkady, and Barr. Dag spoke then about farmers and farmer towns; he spoke further of how they could be turned by a malice into large well-armed forces. A camp's worth of patrollers would never be able to fight off a force like her uncle was describing. And all it waited on was a malice that emerged near a large enough farmer town and got missed by the patrol for long enough that it could figure out how to go about it.

In the evening, Sumac spent some time sharpening her weapons and making small repairs to the items in her travel kit. Rase came up to her with a troubled look in his eyes and ground. "Sumac, can we talk in private?"

Sumac nodded; they went outside and started a walk around the barn. "So, what's got your pants twisted up?"

Rase frowned. "I don't understand about your uncle Dag.... He's not anything like anyone I've ever known. He calls himself No-Camp. Was he banished from your camp?"

Sumac answered, "No, but there was a big fight at the council over his being string-bound to Fawn. He left by his own choosing, in order to go on this quest of his."

"Is he right, do you think? Is the world changing? Do we need to change?"

"He'd know better than me, actually. Certainly we're strained near to breaking; if things get much worse up north, we'll be in bad trouble."

Rase looked down at his hands for a few moments. Then he looked her in the eye. "Why would he know better than you? You're a patrol leader and you've gone to the Oleana hinterland meetings, and he was just a patroller, wasn't he? Except he was the captain for that awful malice last summer. Why did Fairbolt Crow choose him for that job? He was already string-bound to that girl, wasn't he?"

She sighed. "You know, every once in a while at Hickory Lake, we get some patroller who suddenly starts asking questions about Uncle Dag. The patrol leaders worked out a system maybe ten years ago for how to deal with it. I'm thinking it's time for that now. He wasn't always just a patroller, you see. Once, a bit over twenty years ago, he was a company captain up in Luthlia."

Sure enough, his eyes were getting round. He was a bright boy, and she'd seen him looking curiously at Dag's arm harness, so she wasn't surprised when he exclaimed, "Wolf Ridge! He was the captain, wasn't he?"

"Yes. Thing is, though, he hates the memory of that day. He lost so much.... He really hates it when folk call him a hero for it. Up at Hickory Lake, he used to go out on patrol constantly; he'd do his regular times out, and then he'd spend time with the other patrols as well. But whenever somebody started following him around, pestering him about that battle, he'd avoid that person's patrol for a good long time. We patrol leaders generally wanted him with us when we could get him; he was the best patroller in the camp, and a real good teacher. So we'd take aside the patroller who was asking questions and we'd explain matters to him so he wouldn't cause trouble for Uncle Dag. Your job is to pretend you don't know about his having been in Luthlia -- don't hint about it to him, don't hint to the others around you, don't do anything that lets on to him or anyone else that you know anything about it."

Rase frowned. "Oh."

She continued with, "After he returned to the patrol, he put a lot of work into acting like he was just a regular patroller like anyone else. He didn't want to be a captain ever again. But that doesn't mean he only did the usual tasks of patrolling. Many times when there'd be a bad malice outbreak, folks'd bring the reports to him so he could figure out how to keep the problem from repeating. Whenever we needed someone to take over our patrols for a few days, we'd know we could pick him; it didn't matter how bad or complicated the situation was. Whenever something unusual or difficult was needed, we could pick him for the job."

After a moment, she added, "I think he's right about the danger to us. With how overstretched we are just now, we're sure to miss some new-hatched malices from time to time. No reason why one of them couldn't be near a farmer town. And it's true that there are more and more farmer villages and towns in the north all the time."

He asked, "But then why did he have to leave his camp? If things are that bad, shouldn't folk be trying to figure out what to do about it? I'd think they'd want him around to help do that."

She sighed. "As far north as Hickory Lake is, there aren't any farmers near us. The camp's makers and a good number of our patrollers just don't see the problem. Also, even the ones who come across farmers don't always see how the villages and towns are growing. It's slow. But when I think of what Glassforge was like fifteen years ago and what it was like this fall -- I went through it on my journey to New Elm -- there's no question it's turning into a real town. Other ones have gotten bigger, too. More farmers and more danger all the time."

Rase walked away, looking thoughtful. He was quiet for the rest of the evening. Sumac was quiet, too, thinking the consequences through.

Sixteen people hit the trail the following day. Rather like a patrol, except much less organized. And with a mule-drawn wagon. Sumac was glad that Uncle Dag was in charge; she reckoned she'd never be able to figure out how to keep them all pointed in the same direction. Still, she watched him to see what she could learn.

She also spent a lot of time riding with Arkady. They spoke some of Uncle Dag's quest and of life in the south and in the north. Other times they just rode together quietly, enjoying the sights and ground-feel of spring.

Five days later, they reached the first mountain pass. Uncle Dag explained what they'd be up against that night and let the boys figure out how to choose what gear to bring first and what to leave at the base to be collected the following day.

The following morning they began the climb. As one might guess about any carefully-worked-out plan, their first surprise came only a few hours later. The road was blocked by the sorriest lot of sick farmers Sumac had ever come across. A family of four in a rickety wagon pulled by far too few not-overly-healthy animals was stranded; they were unable to go up any farther and they refused to turn back.

Eventually they worked out a plan to bring the family with them. It took the rest of the day to get themselves and the farmer family to the top of the pass, so they camped there for the night instead of at the bottom as they had been planning. Uncle Dag and Arkady treated the papa and the daughter with bog-ague medicine; they'd recover soon enough, though it'd be some time before they regained their strength.


	6. Chapter 6

The following morning, Arkady woke to a gray chilly day. He hadn't been this bleary since the first days of the journey. Gradually he realized that there was more noise in the camp than usual. After a bit of thought, he remembered why -- they'd collected a farmer family in a wagon yesterday. The tiny stream they'd gotten water from last night was too far away for it to be worthwhile to use for washing up and shaving, so Arkady put on a shirt and sweater and got up. He felt grimy and dull-headed; the clinging fog did not improve matters one bit.

As he wandered up to the patroller's fire, his groundsense located Neeta, Tavia, and Remo. Had they decided to join the group going north? It took him a moment to realize that New Moon had finally caught up with him. This did not bring the joy he'd expected it would; strange ... he was pretty sure he remembered that during the first week of travel, he'd have been delighted to see them, but now he couldn't decide what he thought.

Sumac was helping make tea. Arkady knelt on the ground by the fire to wait for some; he'd barely gotten settled when Neeta started in. She went after Dag first. Arkady'd figured out some time ago that Dag wasn't going to want to come back once he got going with his quest. He'd never known such a single-minded person in his life. Sure enough, Dag made it clear right off that he'd much prefer to keep traveling north.

Neeta then turned to Arkady, saying, "Anyway, surely you've had enough of living rough, sir, at your age. We can whisk you right back to your own comfortable house. It's all being kept for you."

Arkady was just about to inform her that he wasn't her doddering great-grandfather -- _'at your age', indeed!_ \-- but a vision of himself sitting in his comfortable bath barrel and spending the next week in it prevented him. With these two thoughts battling for supremacy in his mind, he couldn't come up with a good answer for her. Fortunately, just then Sumac brought him some tea. He sipped it to cover up his confusion.

Sumac then pointed out that there was no need to talk about leaving right away because there were plenty of tasks at hand that needed doing first -- the foremost of which was getting off this mountain. They could talk more about this later. Both Arkady and Dag were agreeable to this plan. As they began those tasks, Sumac offered to help Arkady find warmer water to wash up in as soon as they'd made it down.

By early afternoon, they'd found themselves a campsite in the valley below. The farmer boys left to re-cross the mountain and bring over the rest of their party and gear, and everyone else began to take up their various camp chores. In a short time, Sumac approached Arkady; she offered again to show him where he might find a warm bath. He gathered up his bathing items and walked over to her. At this point, everyone else except for Fawn was off doing various horse-care tasks; she was tending the nearby fire. Fawn wouldn't be planning to follow and pester him about returning south, so he didn't trouble to conceal his movements from her. As soon as Arkady and Sumac were a short distance from the campsite, Sumac closed her ground and indicated he should do likewise.

They walked quietly for a bit through the woods; as soon as they were out of hearing range from the camp, Arkady spoke. "Where are we headed?"

Sumac smiled. "Farther away upstream for the moment. I want to be well out of groundsense range so nobody will have a chance to bother us. When these streams cross flatter ground, they often open up into pools; I'd like to find one in a meadow, so it'll be sunlit."

Arkady kept an eye on the woods and flowering plants around him as he walked; spring in the north was an astonishingly pretty time of year. As soon as they were out of range of camp, he opened his ground wide to soak it all in. Soon enough, they found a suitable place. Sumac laid out a blanket while Arkady set out his soap, razor, and towels on a long flat rock that stood just beside the pool.

Her voice floated over. "I wouldn't mind washing up myself, once you're done. After that, perhaps you might like to come pay me a visit in my tent?"

He looked back to her; she was seated on her blanket with a more-than-friendly look on her face and in her ground. Even more than half expecting this, he still felt a shock run through him.

He blinked a few times and took a deep breath. Then another. "Talk first. Then.... Well, we'll see what we do after that."

She nodded agreeably. He stripped down and washed himself in the pool; it might not be as warm as his barrel, but it wasn't too bad. The flowers all around and the spring scents made a wonderful addition; so did the mating squirrels that were busily chasing each other all around the meadow. He shaved carefully and dried himself, then came over to her blanket wearing a towel around his hips. She took her own bath next; he spent the time appreciating the view.

When she was finished, she came over and sat beside him. He began with, "Am I right in guessing that you aren't looking for a simple dalliance here?"

She nodded quietly, with a small smile.

He continued, "I also expect that you aren't planning to carry me off to Hickory Lake so I can help prop up Tent Redwing." She smiled more widely, and he said, "Nor are you much thinking of coming south to New Moon Cutoff, correct?"

She nodded again.

Apparently it was still his turn to speak. "I can see several advantages to this plan from your point of view. You won't have to be heir to Tent Redwing and displace your mama; you can return to following in your uncle's footsteps; you'll get a particularly good revenge on your grandmama; and she won't be able to take your children from you as she did to your mama. But is this really a good idea? Normally, in a camp, I'd be able to provide very well for us, but just right now.... I'm not even sure we'll be able to come up with a tent to live in. I certainly can't promise much safety; I don't even know if Dag's plans can succeed. If this doesn't work out, you'll have thrown your entire life overboard with no obvious way to pick up the pieces. There's a lot of risk."

Now she spoke up. "I live with risk every day; I'm used to it. I'm also used to living rough, though I'm guessing we'd likely be able to stay in Berry Bluefield's home up near Clearcreek, at least for a time. Maybe more. As for the rest.... Well, I was beginning to think I'd never be able to have children at all. I'd need a man who could help me hold off Grandmama, but her word is law in Tent Redwing. She'd also have no qualms with dragging Papa to her support if she thought it was necessary. She'd never agree to allow me to raise my own children, so there would be fights every day with no end in sight. I remember what that was like from when I was small; before Mama gave up and let Grandmama take us from her. It was that or fight and fight and fight, day in and day out. She got worn out from all the fighting; she gave up because it was upsetting me and my older brother something awful."

After a short pause, Sumac continued. "I swore my own children wouldn't experience what we did. I've looked for fifteen years to find a man who can show me some way out of that life. If I don't take this opportunity, how long would I have to wait to find a better one? Maybe another fifteen years? At that point, the problem would solve itself by me being too old to have any."

Arkady shook his head. "I'm not even sure we'll be able to have children. And then, if we succeeded, they would be raised in a manner unlike what any Lakewalker has ever experienced. If it doesn't work out, things could get ugly quickly. I've thought I must be mad to be taking this road following Dag around. But you've topped him; this is the craziest idea I've heard yet."

Sumac then said, "I already know one bad way to raise children; I don't expect this new way could turn out that much worse. Now I can say this for sure: If Uncle Dag's plans are to succeed, somebody has to be the first to try raising a Lakewalker family among farmers. If they can't succeed -- if we can't find some way to live and work together, we're all doomed soon enough. I'm willing to take a chance and be one of those folk; are you?"

They sat in silence for a short time. Arkady broke the silence by saying, "Yes, I am."


End file.
